Apparently designed by Ken Turner and also apparently 10 years in development the Pro Sport is a classic air rifle. They apparently have tuned and polished bits out of the box, there’s lots of technical wizardry going on inside, far beyond my knowledge and understanding, suffice to say, they are reputed to be very nice springers, in fact, one of the best…

I had an itch, so I scratched it. So I bought myself an Air Arms Pro Sport in .177.
I’ve had it for a week or so now and used it at home and on a range, so here are my initial thoughts…

I bought my PS from Crawley Surplus Store mainly cos I wanted it quick and they were the only people relatively local to me who had one in stock (according to their website) and they were well priced too. So off I popped, but on arrival at their store they only had a .22 in stock, in Beech, but I really wanted .177, in Walnut!

“No problem” said the guy in the store, “We can order one and have it delivered tomorrow”, Wow! After a bit of a haggle where I got £20 knocked off the price, I promptly ordered it there and then and, lo and behold, it was indeed in stock the next day, Great service…. (When I picked it up the next day, I bought a couple of other bits, and also got a discount on those items too, great service again…!)

Once I got it home, opened the box and was greeted with that classic and iconic PS, with its clean sporter lines, no sign of a break barrel or an underlever, very sleek.

I think I got lucky with the Walnut, (a Minelli stock) as it seems to have a very nice piece of timber with lovely grain. And the blueing to the barrel and action is very deep and lush with a beautiful lustre, its almost umptious in its shinyness…

The stock has lovely deep checkering to the pistol grip and to the sides of the forestock. A nice touch is the rosewood base to the trigger grip. The rear butt section has a non adjustable, but thick and ventilated shoulder pad. The barrel is fully shrouded. There are no iron sights, this gun is crying out for a decent scope.

The rifle itself, is a springer, and for those that don’t know, has a hidden, recessed, underlever cocking arm, which lives fully recessed and flush with the underside of the forestock, thus giving it those classic uncluttered and sleek lines. It looks like a “proper” gun…

It’s a big old heavy lump though, (4.1kgs or 9lbs). By comparison my HW97, also a heavy lump) weighs around 4.2kg. (Both weights unscoped). However, I’m no shrinking violet, and I quite like heavy springers, helps with recoil and shot consistency, so they say, not sure anything helps with my ham fisted shooting, but hey, it can’t hurt?

So after staring at it lovingly for a few hours I finally cleaned the barrel with a few pull throughs, a bit of muck came out but it was relatively clean. Then a tried a few pellets through it….

Cocking the rifle is achieved via slipping a finger under the little gap / recess under the forestock and pulling the alloy lever all the way back and down until you hear a solid “click”. That tells you the rifle is cocked. Let me make this clear, cocking this rifle takes some considerable effort, presumably cos the lever is set back and shorter when compared to other cocking levers? There have apparently been issues with older versions around the cocking levers, but I also understand that newer PS’s have a “beefed up” version of the lever, and a different, (longer) stroke and a heavier spring, and in use, it certainly feels substantial and solid.

The lever is then returned to its recess and it is held there, no click, no noise, (useful for hunters), perfectly flush. It really is a very nice piece of engineering. If the lever is not flush when returned, this means it has not been cocked properly, and cocking procedure needs to be carried out again, making sure the solid click is heard to confirm.

Trigger, the PS famously has a gold plated trigger, (not brass!) and very nice it looks too, i'm not usually into bling, but it looks classy, understated, discrete, it does not shout, "look at me".

As per most modern air weapons nowadays, the PS comes with an adjustable two stage, (CD match) trigger. I have not tampered with it so far, as it seems fine, its fairly light, with a very predictable second stage.

There is a built-in automatic safety button mounted above the trigger unit at the end of the action. It engages when you cock the rifle, then have to click the safety off before firing, very similar to the Weihrauch safety in fact, and much better, IMHO, then the “on trigger” safety button, that you get with other AA rifles.

Accessories: The PS comes with its box (fairly plain cardboard affair) and a couple of small hex keys, to adjust the trigger. That’s it, you don’t get a lot for your money, no extra bling or fluff here…

Scope: I opted for a Hawke Airmax 4-12x50AO fitted with Hawke separate two piece mounts. There is three scope arrestor holes at the rear of the action, so stopping any scope “creep” is easily achieved.

Pellets: Thus far I have only tried it with H&N FTT and it very much seems to like those.

Accuracy: Getting nice groups on a consistent basis, out to 30m hitting 25mm groups, which I was very pleased about as I’ve heard the PS can have a bit of a “kick” and I’m no springer expert. I’m sure it will be an accurate rifle, in fact I’m sure it will be far more accurate than my pretty average shooting ability. :facepalm:

Upgrades since buying it: Apart from the scope and mounts, and a moderator, nothing else yet.

What do I think about the Pro Sport? It has exceeded my expectations of what I thought it would be like, good looking, accurate, very well built, dependable. I like it.

Also the 20mm barrel shroud houses both a carbine Lothar Walther(not to be confused with Carl Walther) choked barrel incorporating a neat moderator too.

The compression tube and piston run on synthetic studs and bearing ring, a steel piston weight is factory fitted but as found by many tinkerers is quite unnecessary and often removed to allow the fitting of an after market delrin top hat.

Also not forgetting the internally hidden ProSport anti bear trap interceptor device that grabs the piston in forward stroke in the event of malfunction thus saving a squashed thumb in the exposed breech, but allows the compression tube to be returned to the firing position once the rifle is cocked by means of a little internal pivoting pin built into the underlever mechanism which is pressed closed as the underlever is returned forward once the rifle is loaded, fingers and thumbs out of harms way at this point.

This idea isn't original though as there was a similar device built into the Webley Service series of rifles.

It is ofcourse universally accepted good safe practice to hold onto any under lever or barrel on a spring piston rifle or pistol where practical naturally during loading sequence.

I've had two ProSports now; an early .177 Mk1 that is very fast and accurate serving its new owner well.

Once the Mk1 was sold I subsequently bought a second hand walnut Mk2 also .177 calibre which has the longer stroke and extra rear end stock securing bolts.

I've fitted VMach parts in the Mk2 and it is very consistent and extremely accurate, moreso than I'll ever be.

This rifle represents the finest second hand airgun deal I have had to date. I'm so pleased to have bought it now.

They are a uniquely designed modern classic high end air rifle cleverly designed by Ken Turner and out into production by AirArms in 1996 if I remember correctly.

Interestingly enough Ken had previously built a ProSport prototype from stain less steel in 1986 to further add to the now extremely desirable line up of glittering stainless steel rifle collection.